It is common for users of electronic devices to communicate with other remote users by voice, email, text messaging instant messaging, and the like. While these means of electronic communication may be convenient in various situations, such means are only suited for transferring a limited amount of rich content between users. For instance, while text messages and email may be used to transmit written dialogue between users, and audio, video, web content, or other files may be transmitted with the text or email messages as attachments, such files are not integrated with the various components of the text or email message in any way.
As a result of these shortcomings, electronic device messaging applications have been developed to assist the user in creating digital messages that include, for example, images, audio, video, and other content. However, the functionality of existing messaging applications is limited. For example, such applications generally do not enable the user to combine a wide array of digital content segments (e.g., an audio segment, a video segment, a digital image, etc.) such that two or more content segments, such as segments from different sources, can be presented to the recipient simultaneously as an integrated component of the digital message. Additionally, while such content segments may be captured and/or saved locally on a user device, sharing such content segments with other user devices as part of the digital message and via such applications can be cumbersome due to the size of the audio files, video files, and/or other components of such content segments. For example, large audio files, video files, and the like can require significant memory for storage locally on a user device, and can also require a substantial amount of bandwidth to upload and/or download on most wireless networks. As a result, handling such content segments can place significant strain on user device resources and network resources, and can hinder device and/or network performance. Further, traditional techniques for rendering digital messages require that the video rendering and content upload processes begin only after a user has finished generating and/or composing the message. This constraint can result in prolonged upload/render times once the message is complete.
Example embodiments of the present disclosure are directed toward curing one or more of the deficiencies described above.